


The Master

by DJFalsifier



Category: Dark Souls (Video Games), Dark Souls I
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-22
Updated: 2019-08-22
Packaged: 2020-09-23 18:08:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,144
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20344444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DJFalsifier/pseuds/DJFalsifier
Summary: This one got me right in the feels once I was finished. I like exploring characters that are only mentioned, and in this case there was something about the scant lore of Salaman that really appealed to me.





	The Master

THE MASTER

A Dark Souls fancomic

By Hamza Khabiri and Jess Gulbranson

CHARACTER NOTES:

SALAMAN THE MASTER PYROMANCER: To some degree I have modeled him on the Zen master Ikkyu, renowned for his eccentricities and wisdom (Ikkyu, is a hoot, look up his biography some time), and in flashbacks we see him as Confucian-type scholar, young and fashionable, then as a slightly older man as a priest (appearance-wise I’m thinking the extant portrait of Ikkyu, slightly more world-weary) and then in the present as a beggar, completely wild. When he first appears he is simply in rough clothes with shaggy hair and stubble, but we can use the length of his hair and beard to show the passage of time. His garments can get progressively more disgusting as well. Never wields anything other than binoculars when he skillshots Maneater Mildred when she invades. Smokes a pipe until Quelana destroys it and mocks him for being a “puny firekeeper”.

QUELANA OF IZALITH: As depicted in game, a lonely witch sitting on an island in the middle of the Blighttown swamp. She is clad in her dark robe, and while there is an in-game model of her face, it is very potato-like, as all they are. I have seen some fan art that shows her as alabaster-pale, with stringy black hair. She is invisible at first, until Salaman begins to display mastery of pyromancy.

MANEATER MILDRED: As depicted in game, and we only see her briefly before being blown up by Salaman.

* * *

PAGE 1

PANEL 1: Closeup of Salaman’s maniacal face, hair short but disheveled and chin stubbly, a clay pipe hanging from his crooked mouth.

SALAMAN: I know you’re there.

PANEL 2: Salaman, in rumpled but unremarkable clothes, stands ankle deep in filthy water before a small island of earth, seemingly talking to noone, pipe in his hand.

SALAMAN: There are travelers’ tales, of course… an ancient master of flame sorcery…

SALAMAN: Who accepts pupils once upon a pale moon.

PANEL 3: Salaman is now seated in the water, lotus position. A sour grimace is on his face as he holds the pipe in his lap and lights it with a blast of pyromancy from his finger.

SALAMAN: Across burning sands, over smoldering caldera, scorched ruins…

SALAMAN: ...but I started in a swamp and am in one again. Yet I sense the flame not far from here.

SALAMAN: So I shall sit, and I shall practice.

SALAMAN: Master.

* * *

PAGE 2

PANEL 1: View of Salaman from the waist up, pipe in his mouth and molding a ball of flame between his hands. His hair and beard are slightly longer, his clothes discolored.

SALAMAN: I sought the truth as a scholar, and excelled at it, but there is no truth in the fumblings of sorcery.

PANEL 2: [inset in panel 1] A small framed portrait of a young Salaman, in garb similar to a Confucian scholar.

CAPTION: So the life of a holy man called.

PANEL 3: Same shot as panel 1, but the flame is larger. His eyes are narrowed and a slight smile on his face.

SALAMAN: The miracle of the gods are but shallow artifice. So I became a rootless wanderer, a drunkard and libertine.

PANEL 4: [inset in panel 3] A portrait of an older, world-weary Salaman in monk’s robes. Similar to the painting of Ikkyu.

CAPTION: Following only the flames in my own heart.

PANEL 5: A view of the island, and Quelana is now visible sitting there on its shore.

QUELANA: You say the flame burns in your heart.

PANEL 6: Closeup of Salaman, an expression of shock on his face as the clay pipe explodes out of his mouth in a burst of fire and fragments.

QUELANA: But you tend this embarrassment of an ember, like a puny firekeeper.

PANEL 7: Closeup of Quelana’s humorless face, one hand held up, wreathed in flame.

QUELANA: Now we can begin.

* * *

PAGE 3

PANEL 1: Salaman kneels before a tiny pyromantic explosion on the shore of the island. Quelana’s lower half is visible standing over his shoulder.

CAPTION: A master of sorcery and miracles, yet you make of my awesome pyromancy a child’s foolishness.

QUELANA: Truly a great fireball you have manifested, miscreant.

PANEL 2: Quelana looms, arms crossed, her face disapproving.

QUELANA: Again, until you get it right.

QUELANA: AGAIN!

PANEL 3: [This long narrow panel bisects the page, its borders composed of wild, chaotic flame] From left to right a series of fireball explosions grow in size.

PANEL 4: Quelana and Salaman sit facing each other, meditating. Salaman’s hair and beard are longer yet.

SFX: WHOOOSH

QUELAND: An intruder comes.

QUELANA: Remove this distraction.

PANEL 5: A closeup of Salaman’s clenched fist wreathed in flame.

SALAMAN: It shall be done.

SALAMAN: Master.

PANEL 6: Salaman is laying flat like a sniper, peering through a pair of binoculars.

* * *

PAGE 4

PANEL 1: [Circular view through the binoculars] Maneater Mildred, wielding a huge cleaver, is striding out of the cave entrance where she invades, into the swamp.

PANEL 2: Closeup of Salaman’s face, scowling in concentration, binoculars just barely visible held down from his face.

PANEL 3: Large panel showing an enormous fireball explosion- could be a mushroom cloud. Within the fire is the insignificant figure of Mildred, her body skeletonized and her gear disintegrating.

* * *

PAGE 5

PANEL 1: [similar to P3P4 but it can now be seen that Salaman sits in the water, Quelana on the shore] Salaman’s hair and beard are very long, his robes are layered tatters.

QUELANA: ...I cannot do it myself. I lack the strength, the bravery. But you…

QUELANA: I realize what I am asking, but please…

PANEL 2: Salaman stands erect before Quelana, whose back is visble in the lower foreground. Water drips from his robe and his face is stricken.

CAPTION: Free their poor souls.

SALAMAN: I will not do this, Master.

SALAMAN: A vagabond told me the tale of your family’s tragedy, and your… cowardice. It broke my heart.

SALAMAN: I immolated him for the insult to your good name. But I heard it again and again from wretched tinkers and itinerant priests. I knew that you would not want your flame used to snuff out the lives of unfortunates.

PANEL 3: Closeup on Salaman’s torso, a ragged stack of waterstained pages held in his hands, covered in a dense scrawl of occult characters.

SALAMAN: The Great Swamp calls me. I would use your legacy to help my people, lift them out of darkness and indignity.

SALAMAN: Ask me again and I will do as you wish.

SALAMAN: But I will burn this record of your teachings to ash, and I will never speak a word of your tutelage.

SALAMAN: To anyone, Master.

PANEL 4: Quelana slumps on the shore, her head bowed in sorrow.

QUELANA: Farewell, Salaman.

QUELANA: Master Pyromancer.

CAPTION: END


End file.
